1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technology for supplying information from an external device to a communication terminal.
2. Related Background Art
Conventionally, the i-area (registered trademark) has been put to practical use as the technique whereby a communication terminal acquires information relating to the existing area. In an information search utilizing an i-area, the weather, maps, gourmet, and so forth, for example, are prepared as searchable categories. Work is required in which, in order to read desired information, the user of the communication terminal judges which category this information belongs to and retrieves for themselves the object information from among information belonging to the category. As a result, when the user wishes to obtain local information, time and labor and so forth including the search are required depending on the category of information. This does not mean that the desired information will necessarily be obtained as a result of the search work.
The information distribution system described below has been proposed as one technology that resolves the above difficulties (see Japanese Patent Application Laid Open No. 2002-92236 (second page, FIG. 1), for example). That is, in the information distribution system, identification information on the portable terminal of the user and desire information for specifying equipment that the user desires to use are pre-stored in an information management center. When the user uses a facility, upon receiving identification information from the portable terminal, the information distribution device searches for information that will probably be required by the user on the basis of the desire information and sends this information to the portable terminal. As a result, information that is beneficial to the user can be supplied.